Wendy Williams Shows Off 20-Pound Weight Loss

Talk show host Wendy Williams turned heads on the red carpet Sunday night at the Broadway.com Audience Choice Awards in New York City when she showed off her svelte shape and small waist in a plunging, shimmering evening gown. And Williams, who hosted the event and will soon star in the Broadway production of "Chicago," has good reason to want to flaunt her figure … she's worked for it!

The 5'11" wig wearer recently announced on her online "After Show" segment that she's dropped 20 pounds since last May and is now down to 175 pounds. "[My weight] is under control although it can spin out of control at any given time. You know I love my food," Williams, 48, explains in the video, adding that she decided to drop the weight to get ready for turning the big 5-0 next summer.

"I don't turn 50 for a year and a half but my metabolism is slower and 50, I can see that being one of those milestones that make you want to jump off a building if you don't have it together."

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One of Williams' PETA ads. (PETA)

Though the New Jersey native claims that "snacking puts on weight," she credits making some snack swaps for helping her shed the pounds.

"If you can just cut out a few things of your diet, you're going to notice a difference in how you look," she says. "Stop eating full-fat chocolate bars. Grab yourself two SnackWell's cookies instead of eating the Entenmann's," she implores. "Kale chips instead of potato chips."

Williams also shares that she's cut back on salad dressing, subs mustard for mayo, drinks water all day, and won't allow herself any cheese, which she calls her "kryptonite" that she goes for "like a wild dog."

And, of course, she pays more attention to portion control. "You can have the … healthiest foods ever, but if you're going to eat too much out of it, it's not going to work."

A few months into her new eating plan, animal rights group PETA came calling, asking if Williams wanted to become the latest celeb to go naked (with strategically placed arms and hair, of course) in an ad for the group's anti-fur campaign, joining the ranks of Eva Mendes, Pamela Anderson, Khloe Kardashian, and Bethenny Frankel. She agreed.

The result? Some pretty hot pictures. Williams swears that other than her "gruesome feet" and eczema on her shins, nothing was airbrushed. "When I look at that PETA picture, that is what I look like naked," she insists. "And I've lost about eight pounds since then."